May 15, 2008
Elisabeth Elliot on motherhood
If you are a mom who needs encouragement that your work has meaning - and if you only have time to read one thing today - please make it this. It's long, so you'll need to click below to read the most inspirational part. You might want to save this - and definitely pass it on!
On Motherhood and Profanity
"OK now, which one of you clowns put that bag of M 'n' Ms in the grocery cart?" The mother looks harried.
Two boys, maybe five and seven, eye each other and race away toward the gumball machine near the supermarket door. There is an infant strapped to a plastic board on top of the groceries, and a two year old occupying the built-in child seat in the cart. The mother picks up the M 'n' M candy bag and starts toward the aisle to return it. The two year old screams and she relents, throws the bag in with the rest of her purchases, patiently waits her turn at the check-out, fishes five ten-dollar bills from her purse, receives her small change, and pushing the cart with the babies in it, herds the two boys through the rain to the station wagon in the parking lot.
I go with her in my mind's eye. Jump out in the rain. Open the garage door. Drive in. Close door. Babies, boys, bags into the house in how many trips? Phone rings. Answer phone, change baby, wipe muddy tracks from kitchen floor. Feed baby, put groceries away, hide M 'n' Ms, start peeling vegetables, take clothes out of dryer, stop fight between two older children, feed two year old, answer phone again, fold clothes, change baby, get boys to:
1) hang up coats,
2) stop teasing two year old,
3) set table.
Light oven, put baby to bed, stop fight, mop up two year old, put chicken in oven, answer phone, put away clothes, finish peeling vegetables, look peaceful and radiant--husband will be home soon.I see this implacable succession of exigencies in my mind's eye. They come with being a mother. I also see the dreams she dreams sometimes--write a novel, agents call, reviews come in. TV interviews, autograph parties, promotional traveling, a movie contract--preposterous dreams. Try something a little more realistic. Cool modern office, beautiful clothes, make-up and hairdo that stay done all day. A secretarial job perhaps, nothing spectacular, but it's work that actually produces something that doesn't have to be done over at once. It's work that ends at five o'clock. It means something.
I know how it is. I have a mother. I am a mother. I've produced a mother (my daughter, Valerie, has a two year old and expects another child soon). I watched my own mother cope valiantly and efficiently with a brood of six. ("If one child takes all your time," she used to say, "six can't take any more.") We were--we still are--her life. I understand that. Of all the gifts of my life surely those of being somebody's wife and somebody's mother are among the greatest.
But I watch my daughter and other mothers of her generation and I see they have some strikes against them that we didn't have. They have been told insistently and quite persuasively that motherhood is a drag, that tradition is nonsense, that what people have always regarded as "women's work" is meaningless, that "roles" (a word we never bothered much about until a decade or so ago) are changing, that femininity is a mere matter of social conditioning, that it's time to innovate. If the first-grade readers show a picture of a woman driving a hook-and-ladder and a man doing a nurse's job, see what happens to the conditioning. Abolish the stereotypes and we can abolish the myths of masculinity and femininity.
I hear this sort of claptrap, and young mothers often come to me troubled because they can't answer the arguments logically or theologically. They feel, deep in their bones, that there is something terribly twisted about the whole thing but they can't put their finger on what it is.
I think I know what it is. Profanity. Not swearing. I'm not talking about breaking the Third Commandment. I'm talking about treating as meaningless that which is freighted with meaning. Treating as common that which is hallowed. Regarding as a mere triviality what is really a divine design. Profanity is failure to see the inner mystery.
Continue reading "Elisabeth Elliot on motherhood"
May 15, 2008 ( 5:33 AM) | Inspiration, Mothering | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBack (0)
May 14, 2008
More than I wanted to know about ticks - but I guess we need to - *sigh*
I got a call from Daniel's teacher today because they found a tick behind his left ear.
They wanted to let me know that they were sending it home in a ziploc bag inside a jar (now that's thorough!) and I should get it tested to see if it was carrying Lyme Disease so I could avoid treatment for Daniel.
Okay, so I'm starting from scratch here. We've picked ticks off our kids now and then and I never had a tick tested. But what do I know? Maybe I truly AM the negligent mother in my worst moments I think I am.
So I call my doctor to find out where I get a tick tested and what to do about my son. The nurse says, "Circle today on your calendar. If he develops a fever anytime in the next 12 days, call us." She also says there is no place they know of to test a tick.
Okay, but the school is involved, and so I have to cover all bases.
I call the Loudoun County Health Department - environmental health division - and leave a message. Praying they will call me back today so I don't have to send Daniel back with a cloud over his head. Remember, when it comes to school and Daniel's health, there've been issues :)
In the meantime, the tick comes home in Daniel's backpack, wrapped in a manner to make Hazmat proud.
I look at the tick. The tick looks at me. Daniel kicks off his shoes and socks, oblivious to the drama. The phone rings.
The nicest man in the world – well, you know what I mean with that easy-go-lucky Loudoun guy accent - begins to reassure me that there's really not much to worry about. Which is good because he said there just aren't many places to test a tick. And that if I happened to find one it would cost 75.
And I don't think our health plan - rightly or wrongly - would consider the tick as a dependent.
But I'm a writer and Douglas Hubbard is a guy who knows everything about ticks, so by the time I got off the phone, I knew enough to qualify as an etymologist myself.
So here’s the scoop for all the moms like me – and the mom I was hanging with at Justin’s soccer practice Tuesday who’d picked five off her toddlers when they came in for dinner the night before:
There are different kinds of ticks. Only the black-legged tick – which we now call the deer tick - carries Lyme disease.
Mr. Hubbard took me on a tour of several sites to look at pictures of ticks. Here is the one he liked the best:
We teleconferenced on the tick in the baggie. I got my magnifying glass and determined that Daniel had had a skirmish with a plain old dog tick. Mr. H. said that meant no Lyme disease.
Also, the tick was tiny and flat, which indicated that it couldn’t have been on Daniel very long. Ticks are S-L-O-W feeders and according to Mr. H, a tick would need to be attached for 30 hours to transmit the dreaded Lyme.
I liked this guy, who was making me feel not only more informed, but safer by the minute. More equipped to send Daniel back to school with a note that covered all bases.
I asked Mr Hubbard if there were more ticks this year than usual – which is what all the moms at soccer were saying Tuesday.
Yep, he said. Last year’s dry summer followed by a mild winter had resulted in a higher population of fleas. “Life is good,” he concluded – I assume he meant from a flea’s point of view.
I asked how long he’d been keeping track of fleas for Loudoun County: “Probably longer than you’ve been alive.” Heh. Little did he know I also have grandchildren Daniel’s age :)
We wrapped up our conversation with this advice: Write the date on the plastic bag and save the tick. Watch for the characteristic bullseye rash – but keeping in mind that only 50% of tick victims get it.
If Daniel gets flu-like symptoms in a week to 14 days, “Take the tick and the child to the doctor.”
That’s just in case I read the diagram wrong and the tick in the ziplock bag in the hermetically sealed jar sitting by my computer keyboard is the dreaded deer tick.
Which I’m sure it isn’t.
But why am I itching all over?
May 14, 2008 ( 5:07 PM) | Health, Loudoun County | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBack (0)
Martin Luther King - ditch the ugly statue
Panel Criticizes MLK Statue Design
By STEPHEN MANNING,AP, May 11, 2008WASHINGTON (May 10) - The centerpiece for the Martin Luther King Jr. memorial on the National Mall has drawn criticism from a federal arts panel, which says the proposed statue looks "confrontational" and resembles the head of a socialist state more than a civil rights leader. '
Full story with more pictures here.
Isn't this the pits? Making our beloved Martin Luther King look like some kind of a Marxist icon?
First of all, they hired a Chinese sculptor best known for his statues of Mao Zedong. What's up with that? Second of all, they hired a Chinese sculptor best known for his states of Mao Zedong. Third of all, they hired a Chinese sculptor best known for .... well, you get the point.
Have you ever been to the National Mall - where all the memorials are? They're beautiful, serene, lovely, thought-provoking, reverent.
This jarring statue is planned to be 28 feet tall. That's right - 28 feet tall!!! Larger than the statue s of Abraham Lincoln and Thomas Jefferson. It is so out of keeping with the proportion of the other memorials on the Mall, it's alarming.
I love the idea of a memorial for Martin Luther King, but they need to go back to the drawing board on this one.
And hire an American - I don't care what color his skin is. But I support those who think a black artist would be best.
May 14, 2008 ( 4:53 PM) | Current Affairs | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
2007 Top baby names for girls and boys
The Social Security Administration has just released these officially:
Top 10 Boy Names for 2007:
1 Jacob
2 Michael
3 Ethan
4 Joshua
5 Daniel
6 Christopher
7 Anthony
8 William
9 Matthew
10 Andrew
Top 10 Girl Names for 2007:
1 Emily
2 Isabella
3 Emma
4 Ava
5 Madison
6 Sophia
7 Olivia
8 Abigail
9 Hannah
10 Elisabeth
Three of my sons' names are in the top 10 - Joshua, Daniel Matthew - actually, I don't think Matthew has left the top 10 since 1985 when my Matthew was born and I had no idea I was choosing a name from the top 10. After all, pre-Internet, who knew?
But Sophia? I never thought when I picked Sophia's name that it would be in the top 10!!! Checking the Social Security super-duper calculator, I find that in terms of popularity, in 1989 Sophia was ranked 254. See the chart for yourself here.
And check out your kids' names here. Or for hose of us who need visuals, the absolutely take-your-breath-away amazing Baby Name Wizard - I've linked you to my name on it in case you want to consider a truly RARE name nowadays :)
May 14, 2008 ( 3:27 PM) | Fun Stuff | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBack (0)
When the mom/teacher role doesn't work
I'm rushing out the door this morning, but there's a topic I've wanted to bring up for a while. It came up in a discussion I was having with another mom the other day, and I want us all to hear a variety of thoughts on this topic -
When being a teacher interferes with your role as mom.
While I know that may sound strange coming from me - since I am an advocate of the parent-as-teacher role - I want you to know that I understand from personal experience that with certain children it just doesn't work well.
Children are different and God has an individual plan for each one. Our job is to stay attuned to the Holy Spirit and follow the right direction for each child.
Which is why I believe it's wrong to set out homeschooling with the mindset that you will homeschool every child every year for their entire education. Believe me, I set out that way myself, and only learned from personal experience how that sets you up to be judgmental and self-righteous - not a good place for any Christian to be nor a good role model for kids.
I do not believe that God wants believers to abandon public education. Therefore, it stands to reason He will call some on to that path.
I've also learned from experience - my fourth child - that insisting on carrying out the dual role of mother and teacher can sometimes wreak havoc on the mother part of the relationship. It was at that point - when I surrendered and put my second son in seventh grade after six years of homeschooling - that I had to revisit my own prejudice, give up my own plans, and ask God in humility to show me what He wanted for each of my children.
Oh! I would like to finish this, but must go meet with the people at the high school Jonny is transitioning to next year (more on that later). I have a couple other points I want to make in this discussion, but think I'll save them for Part 2 and Part 3.
For today, I'd really like to hear from you all who breathe a sigh of relief when you hear you don't need to feel guilty because you couldn't make the teaching role work in your relationship with a child or two.
I know a lot of moms would like to hear from those who've made what can be a difficult decision - to delegate your child's education to others.
May 14, 2008 ( 8:36 AM) | Homeschooling, Mothering | Permalink | Comments (10) | TrackBack (0)
World Vision Mother's Day salute
A segmented audio broadcast you might be interested in hearing - and sharing with your children:
A World Vision Report One-Hour Mother's Day SpecialThe World Vision Report celebrates Mother’s Day, May 11th, with an hour-long special focusing on women in the developing world. Women now work as mechanics in Nigeria, and women mountaineers in Nepal. Some women now defy custom by refusing to be forced into unwanted marriages, or by publicly fighting so-called “honor killings,” and by overcoming physical disabilities as wheelchair athletes. Give a listen and learn how “Mom” is more than cookies and milk at bedtime.
At the World Vision site, you can click on different segments to hear about their innovative programs dedicated to improving the status of women across the globe. Do women need to learn to become car mechanics? Well, if they are to learn another trade than prostitution:
Lady Mechanics
In Nigeria the Lady Mechanics Initiative is teaching women how to be car mechanics. Students include former sex workers and women who had to drop out of school. After the training, they can make four times the average salary in Nigeria and their talents are in hot demand. Sarah Simpson reports.
Click here to browse other stories, including:
Saudi Driving
Monique and Mango Rains' Reading
Women Sherpas
Iraq Journalist
Honor Killings
Wheelchair Racer
No Forced Marriage
May 14, 2008 ( 8:18 AM) | Mother's Day | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
May 13, 2008
Barbara Curtis - Lovettsville Library Thursday May 15
LIVE! Barbara Curtis, Author, Speaker
Lovettsville Library
Thursday, May. 15, 10:00 AM Register Online or call 540-822-5824.The Lovettsville Library has invited me to talk with moms on teaching children to read, book selection, and encouraging young readers.
Hope to see some of you there!
Come meet author, Barbara Curtis. Barbara will discuss her book Mommy, Teach Me To Read!
May 13, 2008 ( 3:36 PM) | My life | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Hagee apologizes for anti-Catholic remarks
Breaking news:
Pastor apologizes for anti-Catholic remarksBy JIM KUHNHENN – 1 hour ago
WASHINGTON (AP) — John Hagee, an influential televangelist who endorsed John McCain, is apologizing to Catholics for referring to the Roman Catholic Church as "the great whore" and calling it "the apostate church."
Hagee's support for McCain has drawn criticism from some Catholic leaders. McCain has said he does not agree with some of Hagee's past comments.
In a letter to William Donohue, president of the Catholic League for Civil and Religious Rights, Hagee wrote: "Out of a desire to advance a greater unity among Catholics and Evangelicals in promoting the common good, I want to express my deep regret for any comments that Catholics have found hurtful."
Donohue, one of Hagee's critics, said, "To me, it's basically over." He planned to meet with Hagee.
[my emphasis in Hagee's quote] This is fresh on the heels of my post yesterday where Hagee had only positive things to say about Pope Benedict's visit - see Thank you, Pope Benedict.
I would have preferred if he had ended his sentence w/out the squirmy "that Catholics have found hurtful." I always teach my kids that's not a real apology.
But it still shows some humility.
I feel that the Holy Spirit is moving among God's people, causing them to surrender their prejudice and stand together - as Hagee said, "for the common good." People working in Christian communications have definitely shown less prejudice than the local church. One can only help that this kind of leadership eventually filters down to the local level.
I think Pope Benedict's visit went a long way toward promoting more understanding. And he certainly was a model of Christlike leadership.
May 13, 2008 ( 2:53 PM) | Catholicism, Church Issues | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Montessori principles working at home
If a picture is worth a thousand words, then 76 of your pictures are worth 76,000 of mine.
Enjoy!
Following is the introduction to the above album. For comments on each picture, go here.
Children love to work! The secret to having a happy, contented child is simple: an environment rich in activities specifically designed to engage their attention and develop their skills. And it helps if you know how to lead them into making the most of their opportunities. As a Montessori teacher, I was trained for this purpose in working with children.Here are pictures showing children at work, using the Mommy, Teach Me! principles. Some were sent to me before publicationfor inclusion in my book, but now the album is open to all readers.
Please continue to send me photos of your children engaged in activities as a result of what you've learned from my books, and I will publish here - most recent first.
And for all mommies trying to do their best bringing up their children, blessings to you and yours! Enjoy every moment - they go by so fast! Send photos to megamommy12(at)gmail(dot)com.
My books are available through my site or Amazon (which is a good place to read reviews by other moms, too)
May 13, 2008 ( 9:18 AM) | Homeschooling, Montessori, Mothering, Preschoolers, Toddlers | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Montessori Monday - oops! but now it's fixed
For those reading Montessori Mondays - and linking:
While I was using Mr. Linky to provide links for other moms, I didn't realize that there was another step I needed to take when you all linked to your own Montessori ideas.
Now I know and have taken care of the past Montessori Monday entries.
You may want to go back to see the links -
Montessori Mondays - Teaching kids to sweep
Montessori Mondays - Children's puzzles
Montessori Mondays - Color mixing
Montessori Mondays - sensitive periods
I'm sorry I didn't have my act completely together when I started this. And sorry I missed a couple weeks. Now that I've gotten this up and running and know people are interested, I'll be posting first thing every Monday morning.
I know Beth said that she was going to use this to inspire herself to do something each week. I hope this will inspire more moms to try a new exercise or approach each week, then to write or share photos about it.
If you don't have a blog yourself and would like to share, send it to me and I will share your pictures and observations here.
May 13, 2008 ( 8:57 AM) | Homeschooling, Montessori, Montessori Mondays, Mothering, Preschoolers, Toddlers | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
